Arkansas Lottery Continues Posting Low Scholarship Figures

Arkansas Lottery

Today the Arkansas Lottery released its financial report for the month of January.

The report shows the Lottery took in over $38 million, and paid out less than $8 million to scholarships. This makes January one of the Arkansas Lottery’s better months, but scholarship funding is still low, with less than 21.5% of the Arkansas Lottery’s gross revenue actually being spent on college scholarships.

Lottery Scholarship Funds Supplemented with Tax Dollars

Right now the Arkansas Lottery is on track to pay out roughly $80 million in funding for Arkansas’ Academic Challenge Scholarship–which many refer to as the “Lottery Scholarship”–this fiscal year.

The State of Arkansas will pay another $25 million allocated by the Arkansas Legislature for Academic Challenge Scholarships.

Every year, the Arkansas Legislature’s Joint Budget Committee votes to supplement Arkansas’ Academic Challenge scholarships with state revenue. On average, nearly one-fourth of the the state’s “Lottery Scholarship” money doesn’t come from the Lottery at all. It comes from taxpayers.

There’s simply no way around it: The Arkansas Lottery continues to put up inexcusable numbers each month.

Below is a breakdown of lottery figures so far this fiscal year.

Month Gross Lottery Revenue Paid to Scholarships % Gross Revenue
July, 2016 $38,237,293.92 $8,714,386.39 22.8%
August 35,091,022.09 5,498,714.86 15.7%
September 33,113,391.64 5,773,076.42 17.4%
October 34,061,993.14 5,165,040.54 15.2%
November 37,042,079.72 6,570,979.51 17.7%
December 35,352,159.35 4,596,532.22 13.0%
January, 2017 37,062,291.39 7,947,546.21 21.4%
Total $249,960,231.25 $44,266,276.15 17.7%

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Two Home School-Related Bills Filed

Home School, ,

Rep. Mark Lowery (R-Maumelle) has filed two bills expanding opportunities for home schoolers to utilize the state’s “Tim Tebow” law.

Arkansas’ “Tim Tebow” law lets home schoolers try out for extracurricular activities at their local public schools, provided they can demonstrate academic eligibility and meet any other criteria required by the school

Making “Tebow” Fair for Home Schoolers

H.B. 1474 lets a home schooled student try out for extracurricular activities at a neighboring school district if the student’s resident school district and the neighboring school district both agree to allow it.

Right now, some public school students can attend school in neighboring school districts by “mutual agreement” of the two districts; if both school districts agree it is OK, the student can attend school in a neighboring district. H.B. 1474 gives home schoolers the same option under the state’s “Tim Tebow” law.

The bill also ensures tryout criteria are fair for home schoolers . In some school districts, home schoolers who want to participate in extracurricular activities have been required to meet unfair tryout criteria. H.B. 1474 ensures public school students and home schoolers have an equal opportunity to tryout for extracurricular activities.

Expanding “Tebow” to Private Schools as Well as Public

H.B. 1481 expands Arkansas’ “Tim Tebow” law to let home schoolers tryout for extracurricular activities at private schools as well as public schools.

Under this bill, a home schooler may request to tryout for extracurriculars at a private school within 25 miles of where he or she lives. The private school is not obligated to let the home schooler tryout. Any home schooler who is allowed to tryout for extracurricular activities at a private school would be required to meet the same standards and criteria as a student enrolled in the private school.

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Arkansas Legislative Committee Passes Two Pro-Life Bills

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Today the Arkansas House of Representatives’ Public Health Committee passed two good, pro-life bills.

H.B. 1428 by Rep. Lundstrum (R-Elm Springs) makes it clear that abortion clinics will be inspected at least annually, and it ensures any clinic that fails inspection will be shut down. It also cleans up language in some of Arkansas’ abortion statutes, and it closes a loophole in Arkansas informed-consent law. You can read the bill here.

H.B. 1434 by Rep. Collins (R-Fayetteville) prohibits abortions performed due to the baby’s sex. Recently our friends at Live Action posted undercover videos of abortion clinic employees counseling women on having sex-selection abortions. H.B. 1434 is similar to laws passed in other states. It protects unborn babies from being aborted due to their sex. You can read the bill here.

These bills now go to the entire House of Representatives for a vote.

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